The demand for mobile data and voice communication continues to grow. To meet the increasing demand, wireless communication systems may provide for example cellular-based wireless communication networks which have a plurality of cells. To further meet increasing demands for mobile data and voice communication under conditions where the user equipment travels, additionally mobile base stations and mobile repeater relays may be provided. Mobile base stations and mobile repeater relays may be installed in public transportation vehicles, such as trains, buses, subway trains, or other vehicles, without being limited thereto.
Due to the large variety of stationary and mobile base stations and repeater relays, a cell size of the base stations may very significantly. The cell size may be defined as the size of a geographical area which is covered by the base station or repeater relay to serve a user equipment or terminal device located therein. When the terminal device or user equipment, for example a mobile phone or a mobile computer, is moving, a cell reselection may be needed when the user equipment is leaving a cell served by a mobile or stationary base station or repeater relay. Such a reselection of a cell may also be called handover. However, frequent handovers are unwanted due to an increasing administrative and signaling overhead occurring at each handover and potential risks of data traffic interruptions or dropouts during the handover. Further reasons to avoid a cell reselection may include the resultant decrease in bandwidth which is available for data and voice communication, or the increase in power consumption associated with the additional signaling involved in the cell reselection.
Therefore, there is a need to address at least some of the shortcomings of conventional cell selection techniques. Especially, there is a need for methods and devices which mitigate the risk that the user equipment is served by a base station for only a short time period before a next handover is needed.